1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to failure diagnosis, prediction and remediation of document processing systems based on an image quality defect analysis.
2. Description of Related Art
It is well known that customer satisfaction can be improved and maintenance costs reduced if problems with copiers and printers can be fixed before they become serious enough to warrant a service call by the customer. Systems exist that enable printers and copiers to call for service automatically when sensors detect certain operating parameters outside of permissible ranges. Generally, these systems take effect after a threshold has been reached where the degradation in image quality is directly observable by the customer. For example, given the large number of operating parameters that need to be tracked during operation, a given parameter at a certain value may or may not be a problem depending on the cumulative values of the other parameters in the system. Additionally, systems exist that attempt to diagnose failures in document processing systems based on image quality analysis of the print. Systems exist for image quality based diagnosis of copiers over telephone lines such as U.S. Pat. No. 5,365,310, incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
The systems and methods of this invention provide for automated diagnosis, prediction and remediation of failures in document processing systems based on an image quality defect analysis in conjunction with a machine/device data analysis. Specifically, the systems and methods of this invention automatically identify image quality problems in document processing systems, such as analog and digital copiers, printers, scanners, facsimiles, and the like based on all direct and indirect marking technologies including xerography, inkjet, liquid ink, lithography, or the like, by analyzing specific test patterns via techniques such as image processing and pattern recognition.
Secondly, the systems and methods of this invention, in a diagnostic expert system, automatically diagnose and/or predict machine failures based on the combined results of the image quality analysis and machine data analysis. Thirdly, this invention separately provides systems and methods for determining and executing an appropriate action based on the results of the diagnostic/prediction analysis. Such actions could include, for example, guiding the customer through a repair procedure, automatic scheduling of service, parts and/or consumables and automated remediation of faults, for example, as discussed in copending application Ser. No. 09/464,597, filed herewith and incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
Additionally, this invention separately provides systems and methods for the presentation of the results of the failure prediction, diagnosis or remediation, locally, or, remotely, such as, for example, on a computer user interface, via e-mail, via a web page, via a paging service or cellular phone, or the like, and for the storage of the results, for example, in one or more databases, servers, or device history logs. Therefore, the systems and methods of this invention are capable of performing intelligent self-diagnosis, correction and notification of problems that lead to image quality defects.
The systems and methods of this invention provide a diagnostic/prognostic analysis device for document processing systems.
This invention separately provides systems and methods for identifying image quality defects.
This invention also separately provides systems and methods for automatically diagnosing and/or predicting machine failures based on a combined analysis of image quality data and device data. This invention additionally provides systems and methods that provide a unified framework to incorporate a variety of different diagnostic technologies.
This invention separately provides systems and methods for determining an appropriate action based on the results of the diagnostic/prognostic analysis.
This invention separately provides systems and methods that allow an automatic scheduling of service, parts and/or consumables to be provided to an electronic system.
This invention separately provides systems and methods that guide a customer through a repair procedure.
This invention separately provides systems and methods that allow an automated remediation of faults, either completely or partially, and with or without human intervention.
This invention separately provides systems and methods for the presentation of the results of the failure prediction, diagnosis or remediation either locally or remotely.
The invention separately provides systems and methods that allow electronic systems to be interrogated and controlled remotely over a network for the acquisition of data for use in failure prediction, diagnosis and/or remediation.
This invention additionally provides systems and methods for pooling data related to a plurality of document processing systems to accomplish failure prediction, diagnosis and remediation of the distributed electronic systems.
Specifically, at any point during the operation of a document processing system, the diagnostic/prognostic systems and methods of this invention can be invoked. At this time, machine and job data are collected from the document processing system. The machine information can be obtained from the machine that is being diagnosed and/or from one or more knowledge servers or databases that contain machine specific information as well as population information from a fleet of similar machines via a network connection. Having accumulated the job data and machine data, the diagnostic inference engine performs an analysis to determine the initial diagnosis of the document processing system. After obtaining the initial diagnosis, the system determines the test patterns to be analyzed and the image quality tests to be run. Then, system prints test patterns, and scans the patterns to identify image quality defects. Next, a diagnostic inference engine analyzes the image defects in the printed test patterns to refine the initial diagnosis. Then, the diagnostic results are output, and optionally displayed to, for example, a customer or customer service engineer.
Based on the diagnostic results, the machine enters a repair sequence if problems are found. In particular, the machine can request either a customer or a customer service engineer repair action, or, alternatively, enter an auto-correction or auto-calibration mode to repair itself. Upon completion of one or more, or any combination, of these repair actions, the machine verifies its operation and again checks to ensure the repairs have been completed successfully.
It is to be noted that at any time during the diagnostic or remediation process, additional data can be obtained from the machine by interrogating or controlling the machine and/or requesting additional test patterns be printed, scanned and analyzed.